IER News & blogs

A new book on women's career development edited by Jenny Bimrose (IER University of Warwick), Mary McMahon (University of Queensland) and Mark Watson (Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University) is now available.

This multidisciplinary volume pulls together contributions from sociology, management, industrial, organisational and vocational psychology, geography and career guidance. International perspectives from nine countries also provide compelling narratives about the patterns of women’s career development continuing to reflect structural labour market disadvantage. Published on 18 January 2015, the book features chapters from members of IER staff (Professor Jenny Bimrose, Professor Anne Green, Professor Chris Warhurst) and IER Associate Fellows (Professor Nancy Arthur, Dr Simone Haasler, Dr Ying Kuang, Dr Mary McMahon, Professor Philip Taylor, Dr Pamela Suzanne, Massimo Tomassini, Professor Mark Watson).

This free workshop is being convened by Universities UK in collaboration with the Institute for Employment Research at the University of Warwick. The workshop is intended for participants interested in using labour market information to support their work in UK universities and higher education more generally. It will explore how labour market information (LMI) can support the work of universities and introduce the LMI for All project funded by UKCES. LMI for All is an online data portal which provides access to existing sources of high quality, reliable LMI. The data is made available via an Application Programming Interface (API) for use in websites and applications. For more information on the workshop and to register go to the workshop webpage.

Dr Mary Gatta from the School of Management and Labor Relations, Rutgers University visited the University of Warwick this week sponsored by IER, Sociology and CREW. Dr Gata shared findings from her new book "All I Want is A Job" in a public lecture on 15 January. Her book reveals the experiences of unemployed women as they navigate the US public workforce system and struggle to survive unemployment during the great recession. The lecture brought together interviews with the unemployed and the "street­‐level bureaucrats" who service them, as well as her own experience of going undercover in the US system. Click here for more information on Mary's visit and other CREW events.

An independent Wolverhampton Skills and Employment Commission has been established to provide Wolverhampton City Council and its local partners with a set of practical recommendations on how to ensure that Wolverhampton has the appropriately skilled workforce required to support the City’s economic growth, to support the sustainability of businesses in the city and critically to ensure that residents and young people have access to the right skills provision to give them the best chance of securing employment. Anne Green, who was formerly Chair of the West Midlands Regional Observatory's Economy and Labour Force Topic Group and who has undertaken a series of research projects on local skills issues, has been invited to serve on the Commission and attended its first meeting at Molineux Stadium, the home of Wolverhampton Wanderers FC, on 6 January 2015. For more details see the Commission's website.

Researchers at IER are involved with colleagues at the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR) in the medium-term National Evaluation of the Talent Match Initiative. Talent Match is funded by the Big Lottery and is concerned with investing resources in a number of local areas in England where youth unemployment is a significant issue. The aims of the evaluation are to track the success of the initiative and projects within it - to identify what works well, for whom and in what circumstances; and to share learning and improve practice.

Duncan Adam, Gaby Atfield and Anne Green contributed to the first year Annual Report (click here for a Summary). Gaby Atfield contributed to a special report on the Involvement of Young People in the design and implementation of Talent Match, while Anne Green co-authored a theme report on Partnership Working.